from a fan who goes to the movies for the experience...not a critic that judges them...

Sunday, 29 May 2016

SPOILER Discussion - X-Men: Apocalypse (Part 1)

Note: My Spoiler Discussion for this film will be split into two parts...And welcome to Part 1...### SPOILER ALERT!! SPOILER ALERT!! ###### SPOILER ALERT!! SPOILER ALERT!! ### ### SPOILER ALERT!! SPOILER ALERT!! ###### SPOILER ALERT!! SPOILER ALERT!! ###### SPOILER ALERT!! SPOILER ALERT!! ### ### SPOILER ALERT!! SPOILER ALERT!! ###"They turned him into some kind of weapon..."My love for the X-Men... The X-Men were my childhood heroes. Before the Avengers...before Star Wars even (as I only followed SW since the release of Revenge of the Sith)...the X-Men were my heroes. I watched the movies...I played the video games....sometimes, I would watch the animation series, too. I remembered watching X-Men and X2 over and over when I was a kid. And that main theme music (by the brilliant John Ottman) was the music that made me feel hopeful...and it still does. So even listening to that very same music in the beginning of this film brings back the feels. And some of the earliest video games I played was X2: Wolverine's Revenge and X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalypse. And this was before I delve into the larger Marvel universe. It was all X-Men for me back then - and they were a huge part of my childhood. So, don't be too surprised to see a lot of shout-outs to these movies & games in my discussion points below. And I just want to quickly set one thing straight - in my non-spoiler review, I gave this film an 8/10 - and that was me trying to be reasonable. Because deep down I wanted to give the film a 9/10, for the very reason that it rekindles my childhood memories of the X-Men. It didn't happen to me with First Class or Days of Future Past, but it did with this film, and you will know why in the upcoming points below....Firstly...Weapon X Arguably one of the most surprising sequence in the movie - for those unspoiled by the final trailer, that is. But even as I was spoiled by the trailer, I still find it really exciting - because we get to see Wolverine in his most brutal & animalistic form...right after being turned into a weapon and having Adamantium injected to his skeleton. This is Weapon X. You can even see the helmet & all the apparatus attached to him. And this brings back the memories of my childhood when I played the game X2: Wolverine's Revenge. But also, the place itself (Alkali Lake - Weapon X Facility) immediately reminds me of X2: X-Men United. So this sequence alone gave me a lot of the feels & memories I had with X2 game & film. But about the sequence itself...it's nice to see Hugh Jackman have an extended cameo here...and also to witness Weapon X kill the guards with deadly effiency. An awesome sequence to witness.The X-Mansion The X-Mansion has always been one of the settings in ALL of the X-Men films. But seeing it in this film brings a special feeling - mainly because of two things. Firstly, we really get to explore the different parts of the mansion...the rooms, the classes, the basement, Cerebro...even the gardens. And don't you just feel like you want to live there? And the other reason is that because we are seeing the X-Mansion at its best, essentially. It's still in it's early days, but we got see the mansion running perfectly with all the students, etc. It is so nice to see the X-Mansion as its meant to be. But more than that, the scenes in the X-Mansion brings back more memories for me - and these are the minor details. Like that part when Xavier explains to Moira in Cerebro - where the white lights represent the humans, while the red are the mutants. That is a direct callback to X2 film. And other details are even more subtle. I wouldn't expect casual fans to know this, but Bryan Singer re-used the same sound effect for the elevator of the X-Mansion as the one from the first X-Men. And I know this because I watched X-Men so many times and the scene when Logan first woke up in the mansion was planted deep down in my memory. A very subtle detail, but the feels are there for me...More to come in Part 2...